As MPS board to consider Posley's job, state and city leaders call over district overhaul

 

MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- The job of Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS) Superintendent Keith Posley could be at stake in a special meeting Monday night.

The district's board of directors revised the agenda to add an item considering the "administrative assignment status of the superintendent" Monday. Board President Marva Herndon announced the special meeting during Thursday's chaotic scheduled meeting during which the board pivoted and opted against voting to approve a 2024-25 district budget.

State education officials began to publicly pressure MPS late last week. The Department of Public Instruction (DPI) sent Posley a letter Friday outlining the district's failure to provide an audited version of its 2023 financial books. MPS is now more than eight months late on turning over the data, which DPI officials say makes it impossible for them to calculate early 2024-25 aid estimates for every Wisconsin school district.

The reaction Friday from state and city leaders was varied. At the very top, Gov. Tony Evers and Mayor Cavalier Johnson were measured in their responses to questions about whether MPS needs to be overhauled. 

At a ceremony raising the Pride flag outside the state Capitol, Evers, who previously served as state superintendent, told reporters he wanted to see the delayed financial data before reaching any conclusions.

"Am I concerned? Hell yes, but at the end of the day, we have to work off the data that's available to us," Evers said. "Frankly, it doesn't look good, but at the end of the day, we have to wait until the data is there, then we can make those decisions."

Mayor Cavalier Johnson spoke following an event for President Biden's campaign Friday in Milwaukee. Johnson, an MPS graduate, did not say one way or the other whether he trusted Posley to lead the district moving forward.

"I wanna make sure that the kids in Milwaukee Public Schools have all the resources that they can, and I'm hopeful Keith and the school board are able to make that happen," Johnson said. "That's not my call, as you know."

The city does not have authority over MPS. However, Ald. Lamont Westmoreland said he was open to changing that. While not committing to any position at City Hall Friday, the northwest side alderman said he wanted to explore the possibility of either city or state officials taking control away from the elected school board.

"Maybe the governor selects a superintendent, maybe the mayor selects a superintendent," he said. "Maybe they select the board, or maybe it's a committee."

Like Johnson, Westmoreland did not take a stance on Posley; the alderman said he was neither happy nor unhappy with the superintendent. He did not, however, hide his overall disgust with the district's current situation. Westmoreland said he worried growing perceptions of an incompetent school district will only make it harder for Milwaukee to attract new families.

"If you have a job offer here, if you have kids, you're going to look into the school system," he said. "If I look into the school system, MPS, it looks like s**t, you know what I mean?"

State Rep. Bob Donovan (R-Milwaukee) called for the district to be dissolved. The former alderman whose Assembly district includes a slice of the city's south side said Friday he wanted Evers to step in and appoint a "special master" to oversee a complete reset of public education in Milwaukee.

"If you were to look up 'dysfunction' in the dictionary, it would spell out 'M-P-S,'" Donovan said.

Both Donovan and Westmoreland took particular issue with the knowledge MPS officials knew they were getting in hot water with the state but kept the public in the dark as voters weighed a $252 million referendum that narrowly passed in April.

On March 15, a little more than two weeks before the election, DPI officials said they transitioned from monthly to weekly meetings with MPS in an effort to get the district's financial records.

"It's verging on criminal that they would make a plea to increase the taxes so significantly, and they're hiding so much," Donovan said.

The DPI letter noted the most recent data it has received from MPS is inaccurate, and to offset those past overpayments, "there will likely be a significant reduction" in general state aid in 2024-25. Both DPI officials and Rob Henken, president of the nonpartisan Wisconsin Policy Forum, said the board could respond to those losses by either making cuts or raising property taxes.